Injured bats rescued, rehabed by Tampa Bay Bats

Francine Prager holds an evening bat for students to look at but not touch during a visit with 1st graders at Guardian Angels Catholic School Tuesday. Prager, from Tampa Bay Bats, a rescue, rehab and education organization, brought four bats, two evening bats and two free-tailed bats to the 1st graders in Deborah Iacono and Cheryl McGlynn's classes at Guardian Angels Catholic School in Clearwater. The students are beginning to study the Earth broken down into living and non-living subjects. They were kicking off the lesson on mammals with seeing and learning about bats. There are 1300 species of bats said Prager and 13 exist in Florida with five being found in the Tampa Bay area, she added. All of the Florida bats are known as micro bats and "all of our bats in Florida eat insects," said Prager to the 32 first graders. Prager also brought a small amplifier that magnifies the echo location sound that bats make. [Jim Damaske | tampabay.com]